In our society, we are taught to believe that emotion is more or less a binary choice. There are positive feelings like happiness and joy, and negative feelings like sadness and anger. But it is also possible to feel, well, nothing.

Apathy is the feeling of neither being sad nor happy. It describes a lack of strong emotion in any direction. If you truly feel neither happy nor sad, then apathy is usually the best way to describe what you’re feeling. 

There are varying degrees of apathy, so keep reading to learn about how it works and how or if you should strive for change. 

Why Am I not Happy or Sad? What Does It Mean?

What does being apathetic mean? This is something I’ve personally experienced more times than I’d care to admit because of my trauma. But we certainly all have shut ourselves off, so to speak, once in a while. Sometimes life is stressful, or we go through something major, and we just want to retreat into our bedrooms with a pint of ice cream. When the ice cream does not even taste good, that is apathy.

Specifically, apathy describes the suppression or shutdown of things like:

• Concern
• Excitement
• Motivation
• Passion

This is not the same thing as depression. There is no sadness here, just nothingness. Most of the time, apathy is short-lived and is not a major cause for concern. It most likely is your subconscious shutting off for a bit as a way to avoid depression or even a small amount of gloom. 

On rare occasions, however, apathy can be a long-term condition that should be treated by a professional. This could be symptomatic of a more pressing issue.

Primarily, symptoms of apathy can include:

• Numbness
• Lack of Interest
• Lack of Empathy
• Overly dependent on others
• No interest in learning new things
• Long lasting boredom
• Anxiety

Numbness

People often group numbness as a synonym of apathy, but the truth is it is a bit different. The nuance is derived from their causes: apathy develops first on its own, while numbness comes from emotional exhaustion.

However, long-term numbness, if left completely unchecked, can certainly develop into apathy. Could this happen to you? Pay attention if you have long-term feelings of:

• Feeling isolated from others on an intellectual level
• Not being able to cry anymore after doing so for a while
• Being unable to express joy with favorite foods or movies, for example
• Having trouble thinking or communicating deeply

Lack of Interest

Another symptom of apathy is showing a lack of interest in things that you really should. Look, not all of us are the best actors. When your coworker shows you the 50th picture of their kids and you cannot muster the strength to act excited, you are obviously not suffering from chronic apathy.

Here we are talking about more severe lapses in interest. It is your child’s birthday, but you could not care less. Then a few months later, your other child’s birthday and still nothing. Your anniversary is just a day. Clearly something deeper is going on these situations and you should get to the bottom of it.

Lack of Empathy

Empathy describes being able to “put yourself in their shoes,” as the saying goes. It is one thing to express general sympathy and say, essentially, “Oh, that is too bad.” It is going a step further to actually think about what someone else is going through and feel their pain.

One symptom of apathy is not being able to be empathetic. You simply cannot try to imagine someone else’s pain, because you do not know how to do it. You have not really felt anything for yourself recently, so how can you feel it for someone else? 

Realizing your lack of empathy may surprise you, as it is usually one of the first signs of apathy. Someone tells you some tragic news about a loved one and you get over it way too quickly. This may even surprise yourself and cause some concern.

Overly Dependent on Others

We all lean on people sometimes. There is nothing wrong with asking for help. Some of us may do it a little too often, but that can easily be fixed. Nothing terribly wrong there.

Here we are talking about being more like a rudderless ship. People with apathy do not really have any goals or aspirations. They are just going through the motions in life, from the big decisions to even the little things. 

People with crippling apathy may not want to plan out:

• A day full of important errands
• Time to visit friends and family
• Events they must plan, like going to work or attending doctor’s appointments

Instead, they will rely on others to plan stuff. Over time, this creates an unfair burden on friends and family.

No Interest in Learning New Things

Even on our laziest days, we still strive for advancement. Humans love using our brain power to learn new things and discover the way things work. 

In apathy, we lose all interest in learning new things. Apathetic people will not try to figure them out because they cannot bring themselves to care to know about them. Apathy can explain a long term and consistent lack of desire in some people to:

• Advance their career
• Finish schooling
• Try new television shows or movies
• Explore new activities 
• Experience an adventure

Like any other symptom of apathy, this can become a problem if left unchecked for a long time.

Long Lasting Boredom

Boredom being a symptom of a significant problem is admittedly a little hard to ascertain. We often like to joke that we are doing things because we are bored. Also, feeling bored from waiting at the Postal Office or DMV for 2 hours certainly does not mean you have become apathetic either.

With apathy, we are talking about the unbreakable feeling of boredom that pops up when you should be excited. If there is a happy milestone life event for instance. Or, like we mentioned earlier, not enjoying your favorite foods or television shows. If you seriously cannot shake that feeling of boredom for months, you might actually be apathetic.

Anxiety

At first glance, anxiety and apathy may seem like they have nothing to do with each other. Apathy is not caring much at all, while anxiety is caring a lot. However, they often can be intertwined. Why? Even from my extensive personal experience with severe anxieties – anxiety can be all about misplaced focus.

Take Obsessive Compulsive Disorder for instance, a version of anxiety. You may be hyper focused on making sure you locked your car doors, but that emotion is not irrational. While you are thinking about that, you may not be thinking about something that actually matters. It is not that you do not care, but rather that you cannot care. That is apathy.

Also, anxiety can cause our emotions to be “worn out.” We no longer have the energy for emotions when we need them. That is apathy, even if the cause may be surprising. That worn out feeling, by the way, has to do with the low serotonin levels in your brain used up by anxiety.

Lastly, anxiety takes a toll on our emotional state, which can cause apathy. All that negativity over time can lower our overall level of happiness, causing a neutral attitude concerning one’s outlook on life.

This has a practical, downward spiral effect. If things that used to bring joy now come with so much anxiety, they become work. They are no longer fun. Anxiety then makes you decide you may as well not to do them at all. This leads to a neutral existence, the perfect place for apathy.

What Could Have Caused This Apathetic Mood?

By definition, apathy is not fun. No one wants to be apathetic; they want to enjoy life to the fullest. Emotion defines who we are, from our highs even to our lows. There are plenty of reasons why we may be feeling apathetic both in the short and long term. They can include:

• Sleep deprivation and general fatigue
• Poor diet and lack of exercise
• Heavy use of drugs like pain medications or marijuana
• Another medical disorder

In all these cases, we can end or reduce our apathy by stopping or mitigating the underlying cause.

Sleep Deprivation and General Fatigue

Sleeping is more valuable to us than many people realize. We all know the obvious benefits of a good night sleep like feeling:

• Alert
• Responsive
• Full of energy
• Able to think clearly

Indeed, most of the benefits of sleep have to do with recharging the brain. That also happens to be where we process emotions. 

Sleep deprivation’s effect on emotions in the short term can put our emotions out of whack, causing us to be overly upset, for example. However, months and months of sleep deprivation can hinder our ability to process emotions in general. We end up in “robot mode,” just going through the motions because we do not have the energy for much else. This state breeds apathy.

The cure to this apathy is quite simple: sleep more and be well rested. Here is some advice on how to make this work:

• Do not frequently overexert yourself. Allow yourself breaks and some time to wind down at the end of the day. You should never go straight from work to bed if you can avoid it.
• Go to bed early. There is nothing to be ashamed of in going to bed at 9 instead of 11 or 12. Those extra couple of hours will do you a world of good.
• Wake up at the same time every day. Sleeping in on the weekends is great, but how does that feel on Monday and Tuesday? Have a regular sleeping schedule.
• Sleep in the dark. “Blue light” from televisions tricks your mind into thinking there is daylight, making it harder for you to fall asleep. Don’t use electronics before going to sleep (at least an hour).

If you’ve been following me for a while, you already know I’m a fan of the Chuck Norris of sleep science – Dr. Matthew Walker and his book, “Why We Sleep.” Check him out, he’s amazing. He’ll teach you everything you need to know about sleep, and why it’s so important and the dire consequences of not taking it seriously. He’s been on one of my favorite podcasts too, the Joe Rogan Experience, episode #1109.

Poor Diet and Lack of Exercise

Similarly, not being in the best shape can also be a contributing factor to apathy. This can happen both in the short term and the long term. Eating a piece of lean meat and vegetables for lunch may not be extremely exciting, but you will surely feel great and energized afterwards.

On the other hand, a large slice of chocolate cake will feel great in the moment, but 20 minutes later you will not have the energy or motivation to do much of anything. An ongoing diet of purely unhealthy food and you may lose the motivation for long term plans and confidence to carry them out.

Exercise is also more critical than you may realize. Of course, the immediate effect of a good workout is exhaustion. But an hour later you will feel great and energized. Without exercise, on the other hand, we may also lose motivation. 

Don’t need to do a lot, just do something. And progress your way up. Doesn’t have to be weights training either. Yoga, cycling, martial arts, swimming…there’re lots of different ways to get your heart racing.

Pick the one you like the most, and go for it. When it comes to exercise and nutrition, consistency matters more than anything else. 

Drugs

The problem with both prescribed medication and other drugs is that long term usage can cause lethargic behavior and apathy. The same stuff that is meant to calm you down and relax you can eventually cause negative effects in our general outlook. These could include anything from:

• Antidepressants
• Sleep aids
• Marijuana and other downer drugs
• Alcohol

All of these things have in common the fact that they “slow us down” or “take the edge off.” That can be fine as wanted or needed, but abuse of anything that inhibits energy and motivation can cause apathy as a general outlook. Any type of unregulated or recreational drug can eventually spin our general emotional states out of place.

Even legitimately prescribed medications like antidepressants and sleep aids can inadvertently have this affect. What was meant to stop sad feelings is now cutting off all feelings. With your sleep aid, now all you want to do is sleep.

For apathy caused by things like alcohol, work on reducing your intake by limiting drinking to just parties and social events. Or consider stopping entirely.

For prescribed medications, always speak with your doctor about wanting any change in dosage.

Medical Disorders

Another cause of apathy can be an underlying and undiagnosed medical condition. These can include anything from:

• Thyroid issues
• Schizophrenia
• Parkinson’s disease
• Alzheimer’s disease

The thyroid is a gland in charge of regulation the hormones in our bodies. Hormones control a lot of things, one of them being our emotional well-being. A thyroid condition can either over-stimulate or even under-stimulate our hormones. The mixed bag of emotions causes many people to just shut down, which can cause apathy in the long term.

Schizophrenia, typically a much more serious condition, blurs the lines between what we see as real and what is our imagination. A byproduct of this condition is apathy. When you do not know what is real and what is fake, it is hard to know what to feel emotions over exactly.

Similarly, one of the first signs of Alzheimer’s is apathy. Forgetting things like loved ones and where you live, it is unfortunately difficult to show empathy or fondness for them. Prolonged expression of apathy and forgetfulness can be a cause for concern.

Lastly, apathy can also be a symptom of Parkinson’s disease. We tend to think of Parkinson’s as uncontrolled movement, but that is rooted by synapses in the brain that control such movement firing indiscriminately. This first actually shows up as having trouble with movement.

The phenomenon of feeling “frozen” is quite common among early Parkinson’s sufferers, unfortunately. That physically feeling of helplessness can cause an adverse effect on motivation, causing apathy.

Do I Need to Make a Change?

It really depends. The vast majority of the time, apathy is just another feeling (or lack thereof) that comes and goes. Some days we are happy, some days we are sad, some days we are happy when we should be sad, some days we do not feel much of anything. It happens.

When it does, try using tried and true methods that you know should trigger an emotional response. Try to keep it positive. Exercise, yoga and running, in particular. Look at old photo albums of family. Go to your favorite restaurant. Or my favorite, mindfulness meditation!

Also, force yourself to take the initiative and invite over some friends for a movie night. The first step in breaking apathy’s hold is breaking through its walls. Half the battle is just showing up.

The concern though is in those rare instances when apathy lasts for a long time, like months and months. As mentioned, this could be the first symptom in something more serious, so be sure to talk to your doctor about it.

Recap

We have all experienced apathy at one point or another in our lives, so it is usually nothing to be too worried about. Be true to yourself and push yourself to have fun and you probably will. Try something completely out of the ordinary too; new experiences are great for getting out of the “funk.”

And remember, if apathy lasts a long time for you, there is no shame in speaking with your doctor or psychiatric professional. Remember, there is always someone who can help, especially if apathy turns into hopelessness. Speak to a good friend or family member, or even a mentor. Whatever makes you the most comfortable.

You are never alone! If needed, contact Better Help or Good Therapy. For a lot of these therapists, you do not even need to drive really far and go in for a physical visit! You can Zoom or Skype them from the comfort and privacy of your own home.